Get a heavy duty headband/neckbrace, attach a couple 2-ish foot long metal rods out in front of you at oh, 30 degree angles or so, then stick the audiobytes on the ends facing you. Of course you'd want to have the rods be hollow (cable management, naturally). Then get a fanny pack, stick a T-amp or some other small battery powered amp in there along with an iPod, and voila! Your own personal, mobile listening rig - nearfield monitoring, wherever you go!

Jason is right. The M22s were the brightest, followed by the 80s, followed by the 60s and the 3s. Even someone with one ear would have agreed with this assessment .

Now having said that, Ian and the gang apparently tweak these speakers every month. I don't know what the heck these speakers sounded like years ago.

Now to the audiobytes. You said you were 7 feet away. Is that on the diagonal? How far apart were the audiobytes?

The audiobytes are less bright on the highs than the 80s. I'd say they compare to the 3s in that regard. Using the WMP EQ, I've tweaked them a bit as shown below. Note the third slider. This takes away some nasty resonance on the low end. I don't know if this is natural resonance from the audiobytes or if it has to do with coupling to the surface below. I haven't had time to experiment with that. And then look at how I've knocked up the highs.

Now the forwardness is a different matter. I find that when I form the famous equilateral triangle, I lose the magic. I have to be closer to them and I suppose that's what Ian intended when he said that they solved the "near-field" problem or something to that effect. I work with my keyboard drawer out and I think this is "far-field" for these speakers when they are 32" apart as shown on my desk below.

When they are 32" wide and I'm 24" on the diagonal (keyboard tray stowed), I am "in the zone". The soundstage is simply incredible. I can pick out instruments between the speakers and outside the boundaries of the speakers. And the centre image is right there! I mean, if I close my eyes, I could swear that the singer and I can lip-lock if I was to move forward an inch. It really is amazing. When I form an equilateral triangle with them 32" wide and me 32" away (keyboard tray deployed), the centre image is still solid but more recessed and the sound collapses to the left and right. Now don't get me wrong. It still sounds marvellous and perhaps "collapses" is too harsh of a word. But not as marvellous as sitting close up. If I had bought the Future Shop flavour-of-the-month PC speakers for $90 I wouldn't be as critical. But these are audiophile-grade PC speakers and I want the best possible sound. And I'm not willing to sacrifice my keyboard tray either. If I can't find a solution to this, I am not so sure I'll keep them. It would bother me to no end to know that I am 8" away from Nirvana.

I've also found that the SRS sandbox does amazing things to the sound. I agree with Eric that it's all hocus-pocus and they fiddle with the frequencies but then again, Tom cheats too and uses capacitors, MOSFETS and DSPs . My point is that all recorded sound reproduction is an illusion anyway so let's get the best tools to make the illusion as real as we possibly can.

I'd be curious to hear yours, Eric's and John's impressions on my soundstage problem. My wife definitely agrees with me on this point but she thinks that I'm totally nuts worrying about it . I guess that's why I'm an engineer.

BTW, this isn't shown in the photo below but the audiobytes are now elevated by 4 or 5" on some CD cases to bring the tweets to ear level.

Hmm... I think it's somewhat criminal to equalize any Axiom speakers, but that's beside the point (and likely to cause a firestorm)

Like I said, I was not in the optimal listening position at all; when I noticed the differing forwardness, I was actually kneeling down next to the receiver fiddling with the knobs. My ears were therefore about level with the M80s' lower tweeters, with the Audiobyte tweeters about a foot above.

I've done no experiments with the Audiobytes other than what I've described; as I haven't figured out where they're going to be used yet (on the computer? in the bedroom?), they haven't moved off of the M80s. Which is probably criminal.

The further you sit from the speakers the less linear sounding they will be oweing to the greater influence of room acoustics as you move away from the speakers. I leave mine on flat equalization but its a matter of taste and it depends on what is playing. They do sound best in nearfield listening but we are splitting hairs. My family says they sound good from anywhere in the room, especially compared to my old Koss computer speakers.

Mo, on the soundstage thing, the only thing that comes to mind immediately is if when you moved up to 24" and if you didn't increase the toe-in to compensate for the closer positioning, that you were then inside the axis of the tweeters(or farther inside than before). If so, decreasing the toe-in while at your preferred listening distance might have a similar effect. Another possible adjustment, although you don't have much room to spare, is to separate each AB a few inches wider.

Ok...First: Tex, you must have beaten the single-day record for posts/threads in this forum's history!

As for the imaging, I have no problem providing the volume matches. At lower volume (11 o'lock, for example), then the image deteriorates depending on what I'm listening if I move back. But if I just boost a bit, it's back. But I agree that they are meant to be better from fairly close. Although I did do the dishes a few times while they were on (15 feet away, from another room) and the sound was great.

BTW, I tried for two days to have the Audiobytes more at ear level and it actually made things worse (loss of bass and soundstage). I thought I could adjust so I left it there the whole two days. My ears learned to compensate somewhat, but as soon as I put them back down on the desk, bass improved quite a bit and the whole stage widen significantly. They won't be leaving their position anytime soon!

I will try experimenting with toe-in and also possibly separating them a few inches. I was thinking of screwing down a couple of extensions on the top of my desk. I may end up fouling with my laptop though. The other thing I thought of doing was somehow dropping some plastic rods from the ceiling and securing them on there. That might be kind of kludgey though.

That's very interesting what you describe about soundstage and bass, Eric. I find that when I put them on the desk, they couple with the surface below and I get a bad resonance. Even now when they are mounted on 7 or 8 blank CD cases, I still get resonance. I've been thinking of putting some bubble wrap underneath them or maybe the same, beefy mounting feet that are on the amp.

As for the soundstage, when they are on your desk, do you have them angled up in some way? I find it difficult to understand how the soundstage can possibly be better when the sound field is below your ear level.